1

Because Clinton was the first black president, or did you forget already? :-)

2

That is such an insulting poster. It amazes me that such a talented, graceful lady as Ms. Rice is constantly subjected to racially tinged harassment.

3

The image is startling; the message is insulting but hardly shocking.

The issue of "selling out" is complicated. To suggest that the claim of Uncle Tomism is a "shocking depth of racism" is to suggest that there is no such thing as selling out - that the charge of Uncle Tomism is always unfair. That's absurd. Yet the charge of selling out requires that there be a clear "ethnic position" and that people of color should adhere to it. This is problematic, both factually and politically.

It is obvious that certain policies work to the detriment of minorities. Before the voting rights and civil rights movements, this was even clearer, but that fact was hardly negated by the Civil Rights Act. Today, what is or isn't in minority interests, still more what is or isn't unjustified discrimination, is much less clear-cut. It is not surprising that there are black conservatives; some blacks now have enough stake in the system to have something worth defending, and short enough memories not to worry about what conservatism is doing to those who do not. But that is not to say that there are no issues that impinge particularly, or distinctly, on minorities. And it is natural enough to expect that minorities would uphold the "minority position" on those issues - either out of self-interest or out of solidarity with those like them who need support. When prominent minorities do otherwise, it is not unnatural to at least ask why. That is where the question of "selling out" arises.

A sell-out, I think, is someone who abandons solidarity with those like them in expectation of personal reward. This is different from someone who sincerely supports a certain position because they think it is right, even where that position is opposed by most other members of their ethnic group. A sell-out is morally reprehensible not simply because they support bad policies (anyone deserves criticism for that), but because they have in some degree promoted themselves *by way of* consigning others to further misery - they have undermined the solidarity of the vulnerable group, and given their support to the opposition, when instead they would have naturally been expected to act out of some degree of fellow-feeling. Selling out is worse than simply supporting the policy in question, because it is craven and selfish. But, again, some members of the vulnerable group may actually sincerely support the preferred policies of the overclass, especially as the differences in interests of the two groups become less clear-cut. How do you tell who is selling out, then, and who is not?

Well, selling-out is, again, abandonment of your natural interests, and those who share them, in return for a payoff. So, sell-outs are those who have taken the payoff in return for giving their support to policies they would not otherwise have supported. That makes it understandable why almost any "insider" minority person attracts charges of selling out: they have achieved success or prominence while supporting anti-minority positions, so the suspicion of selling out is not surprising. The accusation is not necessarily accurate, but it is clear why it is so common. Clearer proof comes from a long history of toadying, and from evidence that one's political support for anti-minority positions is the cause of one's rise.

Clarence Thomas is an unquestionable Uncle Tom, and nobody thinks otherwise. He shows little evidence of being particularly bright or eloquent, his entire career consists of promoting Republican-party policies in appointed positions, and he was widely regarded as unfit for the bench when he was nominated. That he worked to systematically decimate minority-hiring enforcement at the EEOC simply confirms his willingness to sell his natural interests for patronage. Colin Powell is a different matter. He rose through an institution with a mixed record of treatment of minorities - benefiting from affirmative action but also confronting racial prejudice. He was slow and deliberate in declaring his political affiliations, and has not been anyone's puppet in making his choices. His political career grew out of his military experience; he spent most of his life in a role that did not depend on patronage. He is a loyal subordinate but has been forthright about disagreeing with party, or even White House, policy when he felt he should - especially on issues of interest to minorities. And he is of unmistakeable ability and intelligence; there is no one who questions whether he is qualified for his many responsible positions. When Harry Belafonte labeled him an Uncle Tom, many on the left were as shocked as those on the right, and the label has not stuck. Belafonte apparently meant that it was wrong for a person of color to serve an administration so hostile to people of color - a sentiment that has some common-sense appeal to it - but his implicit claim that Powell was selling out in doing so was probably wrong, and has not been widely shared or repeated. (In contrast, you can find blacks willing to call Clarence Thomas an Uncle Tom simply by looking out your window.)

Now what of Condoleezza Rice? I think everyone agrees she is as qualified, in her own way, as Colin Powell is in his. She is educated and has serious political credentials, as well as academic and business experience. Why she chooses to serve right-wingers is harder to say. She does not spend most of her time on minority-related issues, but she is seemingly more willing than Powell to agree with Republican policies, or at least less willing than Powell to speak out against them. She is widely respected among minorities, but also viewed as a disappointment by many for her failure to champion minority issues. In this sense, she works against minority interests by providing a respected black face to an administration that is loathed by most minorities. A sell-out? Hard to say. Fighting for Whitey? Well, she's certainly fighting for George W. Bush, and anything that strengthens the Bush administration is hardly in minority interests. Is she deliberately undercutting minorities, as the poster appears to imply? I doubt many people believe that. But there are many who view her as comforting the enemy - and far more so than Powell, given her obviously greater enthusiasm for the Bush administration and conservative politics in general.

What is racist about saying that? If it is racist to expect minorities to support pro-minority policies, and to criticize those who sell their support for the opposite, then is it religious bigotry for the Catholic church to condemn pro-choice Catholic politicians? Presumably they see pro-choice Catholics in the same light as minorities see anti-affirmative-action blacks (thought the comparison is actually unfair to blacks - it is actually in their interests for Catholics to be pro-choice). Is it discriminatory to condemn John Walker Lindh for joining the Taliban? His adherence to Islam was apparently less self-serving than Clarence Thomas's rejection of affirmative action - and did less damage. Why should we question his motives? If we have any expectations that people will commit to policies favored by groups they are associated with - and we do - then it is hardly racist to ask why some minorities do not.

It is not impossible that some minorities would oppose the "minority position" on some issues - but it is not racist to ask why they do so, to take note when they do so from self-serving or craven motives, and to upbraid them for the latter when justified. And such charges are not necessarily racist even when they are wrong (they may just be wrong). Minorities don't get a free pass with their patronage. Republicans can ladle on some limited rewards, but they can't shield them from scrutiny.

Why do minorities support Democrats? Because Democrats support minorities - far more sincerely, and far more consistently, than the Republicans do. When the Republicans have more minorities on the stage of their 2000 convention than they have on the entire convention floor, minorities recognize that as tokenism. When they have a few prominent minorities mouthing Republican policies from privileged positions given them by Republicans for that purpose, minorities are entitled to wonder a bit about that, also.

4

Like they did in 1861?

5

The claim that Clarence Thomas is an Uncle Tom is as racist as the claim that Condoleeza Rice and Colin Powell are. Uncle Tom thought it was his duty to serve white people and that black people had no lives of their own. That's clearly not what's going on with Justice Thomas. He was raised in a mostly-white environment in a rich boarding school, and his cultural environment is therefore not the same as Powell and Rice. To expect that all black people should have a certain cultural background is quite racist. To assert that because of skin color he must have certain natural interests, even if he doesn't have the cultural baggage that black people in the U.S. develop to call mainstream culture "white culture" (which is at best a morally inappropriate misnomer and is probably more of a deliberate deceit on the part of black so-called leaders).

He isn't putting aside any natural interests. He has a view. That view is that everyone should be treated equally regardless of race or social background. His political views stem from traditional Catholic natural law theory, as do Scalia's. It may be that he hasn't thought as carefully about his views as some people do. I don't know. Even if that's true, it doesn't make him an Uncle Tom.

6

I must say that I read Kevin Keith's post with a troubled heart if not a jaundiced eye.
I happen to be black, of mixed raced actually, 37 years old and a conservative republican. I have attended Georgetown University, the University of California, Berkeley and the University of Nebraska-Lincoln. I hold a BA and MA in History. I resent the whole implication of his post about Clarence Thomas and Condoleeza Rice. No black person is born with a black person's handbook upon birth. Guess what, like everyone else God gave us a mind to think freely.
Blacks in this country orginally were republican. Democrats did not always embrace black people. Freedom of thought is not restricted to white people Kevin. I can choose to believe in a conservative philosophy if I choose to whether it suits my status finacially or religiously. I don't have to be a lemming and join the crowd who believes that the only hope is big government programs that take away pride and individual responsibility. Apparently you are not aware that the first Black senator in this country was a republican!
It's funny that when white people choose to be conservatives they're not sell outs, they are exercising their freedom of expression, but let a Black person do that and he's a sellout! HMMMM.....double standard....or is this another way for some to just keep Blacks on the plantation!

7

Derrick puts his finger on the central issue: "No black person is born with a black person's handbook". This is identical to what I said: "some members of the vulnerable group may actually sincerely support the preferred policies of the overclass, especially as the differences in interests of the two groups become less clear-cut". Derrick misstates my position, however, as: "when white people choose to be conservatives they're not sell outs, they are exercising their freedom of expression, but let a Black person do that and he's a sellout". The definition I offer - "selling-out is, again, abandonment of your natural interests, and those who share them, in return for a payoff" - explicitly distinguishes between sincere conservatives and sellouts. The difference has to do with whether the conservative position is adopted sincerely or opportunistically. (That's why it's called "selling out". The point is not that you hold conservative positions - that would be called "being a conservative" - but that you adopted them insincerely in return for personal patronage, and allow yourself to be used against others' interests for that reward.)

Derrick's position, and that of others who object to the sellout label, seems to imply that there is no such thing as selling out - that there are in fact no "natural minority position" and thus nothing to betray - that adherence to conservative positions has nothing to do with the interests of minorities. This is clearly false. We don't have to demand that all minorities vote Democratic, or that they hold particular positions on every so-called "minority issue," to observe that some issues are of particular concern to minorities, and that conservatives have been in the wrong on many of the most important ones. Every advance in minority interests has been due to liberals. Every major contentious issue greatly impacting minorities has seen liberals in the right and conservatives defending all that was wrong and needed to be done away with. Only recently has the US evolved far enough in the direction advocated by liberals that it even *makes sense* to imagine blacks might trust conservatives on issues that are not as directly minority-related, like economics or national defense.

To imagine that there aren't "minority issues" with clear right and wrong positions is to imagine that many of the major issues of recent decades - voting rights, desegregation, due process, not to mention more contentious issues like affirmative action or urban renewal - did not impact minorities in any distinct way. That's ridiculous. And, given that there are "minority issues" in which "minority interests" and the consensus of opinion among minorities fall reasonably clearly on one side, it is hardly objectionable to wonder why some minorities support the other side, or to note that that support seems to be correlated with reward and patronage.

It is not necessarily "selling out" to be a black conservative. It is selling out to be a black person who benefited from affirmative action and then denied it, received an appointive position as head of the office charged with enforcing affirmative action from an administration outspoken in its opposition to the policy and then devoted himself to dismantling it, and then, with limited experience and qualifications widely judged inadequate, was appointed to increasingly important judgeships where he distinguished himself by continued hostility to civil rights law. Clarence Thomas is a sellout because he has had an entire career of positions he would never have achieved except by his political subservience, and has gained advance by systematically hindering the aspirations of people like himself. He sold himself and others like him for personal reward. Powell clearly did not, and has been outspoken on some minority issues even in opposition to others in his party; Rice probably did not sell herself out but has largely ignored minority issues. The result: Thomas is held in wide contempt, Powell is held in universal admiration, and Rice is largely respected but somewhat resented as well. That doesn't sound like racism; it sounds like judging people on the basis of their behavior, and making careful distinctions based on their history.

As far as party affiliations go, the Republicans' continued waving of the bloody shirt of Lincoln only underscores their bankruptcy throughout the 20th Century. Certainly the parties have changed sides on minority issues over the years - much to the Democrats' credit and the Republicans' discredit. Go ask Trent Lott what he meant by saying that the country would have been better off electing a segregationist, and then tell me who is "keep[ing] Blacks on the plantation".

Regarding whites and "selling out", it is certainly not true that whites cannot be sellouts; they just cannot, for the most part, sell out their own interests on racial issues by way of adopting conservative opinions, since the conservative politicians have largely favored white interests. Whites can be, and have been, accused of selling out on class issues (FDR), liberal politics (Yippies-turned-stock-brokers), class/military issues (college draft deferments), and other cases. There is nothing inherently wrong with making such accusations (though they may be accurate or inaccurate in particular cases). There is nothing wrong with accusing minorities of selling out minority interests on racial issues either, though as ever such accusations should be made carefully and on the evidence.

8

While I appreciate Kevin agreeing with me on the subject of there being no "black playbook", I'm shaking my head over the rest of his response. Affirmative action is not the cure all that the cadillac liberals would have us believe that it is. Basically it tells blacks and other minorites that you don't have to be good enough to compete we'll just get you'll a spot in the best schools in America whether you deserve it or not. At my alma mater Cal Berkeley, despite, the wishes of people of California, the adminstrators still employ the morally bankrupt policy of admitting unqualified minorities to Cal and denying qualfying applicants who are white and asian. The drop out rate among the affirmative action students is somewhere in the neighborhood of %60 and I may have lowballed it.
Instead of admitting unqualified applicants (including those with GEDs), we should fix the public schools (vouchers for DC schools anyone?) and send unqualified applicants to community colleges and state colleges first.
Welfare and other social programs have done more to undermine the social structure of the black family than anything else in this country's history. Why should someone like Dr. Rice or Justice Thomas have justify their personal beliefs because they don't square with what white liberals think black people should believe? Dr. Rice was not a child of privilege neither was I for that matter? My grandparents were both victims of racism and my grandfather saw a blackman hanged in the south for no reason other than he was black.
I am a reupublican because philosophically whether it is on defense issues, religion, social, financial, or others it suits me. It is not incompatible with me being black. I am an American first. Democrats and liberals tend to forget that crucial point and use race to divide and scare minorities. "You need government to protect you,feed you, clothe you, give you money.....etc........"
The Civil Rights Act was not passed without republicans and it rather interesting that the first important and key cabinent positions assigned to black americans were made by a republican president. Bill Clinton's vaunted cabinent that was supposed to look like America didn't and even if it did what did it accomplish?

9

It's ignorance and misinformation. Read my blog entry, "Why Courting the Black Vote Won't Work."

10

Explain to me again why minorities support far-left Democrats?

Because unlike the far-right, they actually "get" satire. :)

11

Explain to me again why minorities support far-left Democrats?

Because unlike the far-right, they actually "get" satire. :)

12

Because unlike the far-right, they actually "get" satire. :)

If you like that then I can show you some "satire" that the Klan puts out that you're sure to love.

13

That confirms it. Shallow minds are still being found in the gutter.

14

Joe:

I guess I fail to see how accusing the current administration of racism and tokenism is itself racism.

15

T.,

Why is it expected that Democrat's will have minorities in cabinet positions but when Republican's do it then it becomes "tokenism?" And explain to me why the administration is "rascist." Since Condi and Colin are part of that administration are you claiming that they are rascists also?

16

Why is it expected that Democrat's will have minorities in cabinet positions but when Republican's do it then it becomes "tokenism?"

Because Republicans seem to do so considerably less often, and because their party platform is remarkably weak on race issues. Just exactly how is privatizing schools going to benefit poor, inner city blacks, for example?

As for Colin Powell, I don't think he's a racist at all. I do, however, believe that he has compromised himself by accepting the cabinet position. Listen to his speech at the 2000 RNC, and he sounds an awful lot like a Democrat. He basically scrapped all that when he accepted the post, and has been made irrelevant since. I can't remember a Secretary of State who has been in the news less frequently than Colin Powell.

17

Kevin Keith,

Derrick puts his finger on the central issue: "No black person is born with a black person's handbook". This is identical to what I said: "some members of the vulnerable group may actually sincerely support the preferred policies of the overclass, especially as the differences in interests of the two groups become less clear-cut".

The overclass? Let's be frank here; you're essentially claiming that any black person who breaks with the liberal Democratic line held by most blacks is a 'sell-out,' a.k.a. an 'Uncle Tom.' You're just too timid to come out explicitly admit this, because you yourself realize what a despicable and racist position is is to take. That doesn't get you points for intellectual honesty or courage.

So please, don't pretend that you are expressing the same viewpoint as others in this forum. You are expressing a view that left-wing politics are the only proper politics for blacks, and that those who bump the line actually deserve to be the victims of racist rhetoric. I suppose everyone else here has simply been too polite to note this.

To imagine that there aren't "minority issues" with clear right and wrong positions is to imagine that many of the major issues of recent decades - voting rights, desegregation, due process, not to mention more contentious issues like affirmative action or urban renewal - did not impact minorities in any distinct way. That's ridiculous.

Affirmative action does not have a clearly identifiable 'right' and 'wrong' minority position like the other issues you mention. Once equality under the law is achieved, and de jure racial discrimination is all but eliminated, it is nothing short of racial animus to begin labeling blacks as 'sell-outs' for differing with the liberal agenda on certain points. Accordingly, all you are doing is grouping together modern issues pertaining to special treatment for blacks along with historical issues of equal rights and hoping we can't tell the difference. I don't find that to be honest either.

Morevoer, minorities are, in fact, very divided on affirmative action (and probably 'urban renewal' as well, considering that not all minorities live in the inner city). Just mention 'racial preferences' compared with a purely merit-based system, and you'll find the support for preferences to be negligable accross racial boundaries.

Every advance in minority interests has been due to liberals.

Wrong. Slavery was primarily ended by conservatives, especially by Lincoln, a self-identified conservative.

Clarence Thomas is a sellout because he has had an entire career of positions he would never have achieved except by his political subservience, and has gained advance by systematically hindering the aspirations of people like himself.

No, you call him a 'sellout' because his happens to disagree with you. He had no obligation to support a system he benefited from if he believed it to be wrong, and neither was he obligated to support any program that likewise aided blacks at the expense of whites or the American taxpayer. That you would condemn Thomas with racially-charged language for having deeply held views different from you own says a great deal about you, but nothing about him.

As far as party affiliations go, the Republicans' continued waving of the bloody shirt of Lincoln only underscores their bankruptcy throughout the 20th Century. Certainly the parties have changed sides on minority issues over the years - much to the Democrats' credit and the Republicans' discredit.

I would say exactly the opposite. The Democrats went from endorsing one policy of keeping blacks down for the sake of white supremacy to a policy of keeping blacks subservient to the government for the sake of maintaining a political coalition. In neither case did the Democrats support equality under the law. The Republicans, on the other hand, always advocated equality and freedom and nothing more.

There is nothing wrong with accusing minorities of selling out minority interests on racial issues either, though as ever such accusations should be made carefully and on the evidence.

That's something you appear incapable of doing.